Joshua Bell - Joshua Bell At Home With Friends

Renowned violinist, Joshua Bell has released Joshua Bell At Home With Friends, an eclectic mix of selections from disparate genres (bluegrass, jazz, classical, rock) and featuring a very diverse group of guest artists. At Home With Friends is meant to convey the experience of an intimate evening of chamber music like those Bell sometimes hosts in his New York home. The generous number of tracks (16) includes compositions by Gershwin, Regina Spektor, Lennon/McCartney, Edvard Grieg and Ravi Shankar. Guest artists include Sting, Chris Botti, Josh Groban, Kristin Chenoweth, Sam Bush and Marvin Hamlisch. And, through the software engineering magic of Zenph Studios, Sergei Rachmaninoff “performs” the second movement of Grieg’s “Sonata No. 3 in C Minor for Violin and Piano” along with Bell. As enjoyable as all of the other tracks may be, if you have the least bit of geek DNA you’ll find this technology and the results amazing...MORE

Poncho Sanchez - Psychedelic Blues

Poncho Sanchez is back with a great collection of material written by jazz greats Herbie Hancock, Freddie Hubbard, John Coltrane and Horace Silver, as well as a couple of original compositions from within the band, all performed in the venerated traditional Afro-Cuban jazz style. The new release, Psychedelic Blues, is titled for a track composed by Sonny Henry who wrote Santana’s hit “Evil Ways” (also recorded by Willie Bobo). On recent albums (he has over 26 in addition to his recordings with Cal Tjader) Sanchez has shown a penchant for Stax R&B and Motown sounds, but on Psychedelic Blues he is back in his Be-Bop and Swing tinged Latin Jazz groove...MORE